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Consumer Democracy User Agreement

By using this website, you indicate your acceptance of the following PartnerServe Company Software License Agreement.

Introduction

We start every new user relationship with an agreement. It spells out what you can expect from us, and what we can expect from you. We do not know each user personally, so it is important to set out the ground rules in advance. If you agree to what you read below, welcome to our system!

If you have any questions about any part of the agreement, please send us an e-mail about it. We encourage dialog on why these agreement provisions are important for our system. We are willing to work with you on making changes if a consensus develops that there is a better approach.

Please remember that until you and we have an agreement in place you will not receive full access to our system and you are not authorized to use it.

Access

In return for your contribution, we will give you access to specific file and message areas on our system. Initially, these may include:

  1. Public message areas for reading and posting messages.
  2. File transfer areas for uploading and downloading files and browsing files.
  3. Chat areas for real time discussions with other users.
  4. Review areas where user reviews are posted.
  5. Statistical report areas where summary information is displayed.
We may withdraw access to our system or change our access policy from time to time. We will try to let you know about such changes in advance.

System Rules

In order to keep this system attractive and useful for all users, you need to follow the rules we set for use of the system. You will find some of our rules here in this agreement, and others in bulletins posted at various points in the system.

Here are some of the basic rules for our system:

  1. Recognize that this is an open forum in the public view and no form of confidentially is provided.
  2. Respect other users of the system. Feel free to express yourself, but do not do anything to injure or harm others, in particular, if you dislike someone else's ideas, you can attack the ideas, but not the person.
  3. We want people to speak freely on our system, but if you misuse that freedom to abuse others, we will take liberty of cutting that discussion short.
  4. Do not use our system for anything that might be illegal. This system may not be used to encourage anything to do with illegal drugs, gambling, pornography, prostitution, child pornography, robbery, spreading computer viruses, software infringement, or other crimes.
  5. If you elect to provide us with your e-mail address or other information that pertains to you as an individual, we will not make that information commercially available for the purpose of constructing mailing lists or to compile information on you as an individual, such as to marketing organizations, mailing listers or similar parties, unless you have given us permission to do so. We must reserve the right to release information if required by a court of law or petitioned by summons for legal reasons. We alse reserve the right to distribute aggregate or statistical information or other compilations that do not reveal your personal identity. If this service or the entire company is sold to another company we reserve the right to transfer the information we have collected as part of the sale.
  6. You may not advertise commercial products in the review areas.
  7. You may not review or make contributions regarding any product if you are an agent, representative or employee, paid or unpaid, of a company that sells the product, or if you have any other conflict of interest relationship to the product.  Reviews by agents or others engaged in public relationship building for products are disallowed.
We retain the right to move items to other places on the system or to make duplicate copies in multiple areas, or to change or modify the titles of items, or delete items that violate rules, policies or guidelines.

You agree to use our search facilities only to retrieve small amounts of information and not to extract information for use outside this system.

Remember that the person to whom you send electronic mail to is not legally required to keep it secret. We reserve the right to make public any e-mail sent to us.

Hyperlinks to other Internet resources are provided for your convenience. We have selected these resources as having some value and pertinence, but their development and maintenance are not under direction. Thus, the content, accuracy, opinions expressed, and other links provided by these resources are not verified by us.

Respect the security of our system. Do not try to gain access to system areas private to us, or to other users.

Points & Tokens

We are still researching the rewards we can offer for points and tokens. Currently, during our intitial phase we cannot promise benefits. We will accumulate your points (subject to system failure) during this period and make an announcement when a policy has been finalized.

Editoral Control

We want our system to be a worthwhile place for all users. This does not mean that everyone can do what they choose on this system, regardless of its effect on others. It is our job to accommodate the common needs of all users while we strive to meet our own goals for the system.

We will not monitor all messages because we want to keep the message traffic moving quickly and smoothly. If, however, we see messages that violate the rules, threaten the order of security of the system, or use the system in ways we feel threaten its quality or worth, we will take appropriate action

Our editorial control includes normal housekeeping activities, such as changing subject headers in messages and deleting profanities, but it goes beyond that. If a user persists in posting messages that we previously warned should not be on the system, those messages will be deleted, and the user may be locked out. If any user violates the rules, he or she may be warned, or simply locked out.

Ownership of Materials

You own your postings, but give us an unrestricted license to republish, reorganize, create libraries or statistics, or any other derivative work. We also retain full and exclusive rights to the collective work.

We own the user interface, the look and feel, the unique democratic dimensions of interaction, and all creative and unusual manners in which the data is organized. You cannot reproduce any message thread from our system, either electronically or in print, without our permission. You agree not to attempt to examine, disassemble, or otherwise access the computer source code on which this system is based.

Limitation of Liability and Indemnity

The great danger for us is that we might be held accountable for the opinions or wrongful actions of our users. We did not start this system to take the blame for the actions of others. Accordingly, we need all users to take responsibility for their own actions, and to accept that an act of another user that damages them must not be blamed on us, but on the other user. These needs are accomplished by the following paragraph.

We expressly disclaim all liability for the use or interpretation by others of information contained in our system. Decisions based on such information are the sole responsibility of the decision-maker. In exchange for the use of the site, you agree that we will not be responsible to you for any indirect, consequential, special or punitive damages or losses you may incur in connection with our system. In addition, you agree to defend and indemnify us and hold us harmless from and against any and all claims, proceedings, damages, injuries, liabilities, losses, costs, and expenses (including reasonable attorneys' fees) relating to any acts by you or materials or information transmitted by you in connection with our system leading wholly or partially to claims against us or our system by other users or third parties.

We warrant that this site is intended to contain in part or in full information provided by users.

DISCLAIMER & LIMITATION OF WARRANTIES

THIS SITE IS PROVIDED ON AN AS-IS BASIS. WE DISCLAIM ALL OTHER WARRANTIES, EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, AMONG OTHERS, IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. IN NO EVENT SHALL WE BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES, INCLUDING, AMONG OTHERS, DAMAGES FOR LOSS OF BUSINESS PROFITS, BUSINESS INTERRUPTION, INFORMATION, OR ANY OTHER LOSS ARISING OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THIS SYSTEM. YOU MAY HAVE RIGHTS WHICH VARY FROM STATE TO STATE, AND SOME STATES DO NOT ALLOW CERTAIN LIMITATIONS ON LIABILITY.

Additional Provisions

In addition to the terms spelled out elsewhere in this document you agree to the following

Every expression of yours is offered as an opinion rather than an asserted fact.

  1. You may not violate another person's privacy.
  2. You may not use CD for your own commercial advantage.
  3. You agree to avoid conflict of interest when you provide information.
  4. You agree to refrain from providing information on products offered by companies you work for, own stock in, or otherwise may benefit from.
  5. You may not pose as someone else or impersonate a role that is not your own.
  6. You agree to express yourself truthfully. Honest mistakes may occur but deliberate falsehoods are prohibited. You agree to make your best effort at being fair.
  7. You agree not to vote more than once by logging in with different user names or other means.
  8. You use the system understanding that we cannot guarantee the accuracy of information because it is provided by users.
  9. You agree not to violate copyright laws when you contribute materials.
  10. You agree not to violate any laws of any kind as part of your on-line actions.
  11. You recognize that this site is an open forum in the public view and no form of confidentiality is provided.
  12. You own the postings that you make but grant us the right to use them in creating a new derivative work.
  13. We do not guarantee the validity of the data or statistics derived therefrom, or the security of the system. Viruses and bugs may result in system malfunctions.
  14. We do not implement, support or permit use of an anonymous relay system.
  15. We own full rights to threads of discussion and encourage moderators to superimpose thread organization on postings wherever possible.
  16. You agree not to do deliberate harm, and not to engage in negligent or reckless conduct.
  17. You understand the risks associated with using this information since it may contain inaccuracies and misleading information. We are not responsible for users' actions in this service.
  18. You agree not to use any automated means to access or collect information from the site.
  19. You agree not to share your login name (user id) or password with others for the purpose of entering the site without individual registration.

Choice of Law

Our system can be reached by users from all fifty states and around the world. Each of these places has a different set of laws. Since we cannot keep track of all these laws and their requirements, you agree that the law of our own state and country, Massachusetts, U.S.A., will apply to all matters relating to this agreement and to our system. In addition, you agree and consent that if there is any legal action against us, the courts of Massachusetts, U.S.A. will have exclusive jurisdiction and be the exclusive venue for any such legal actions.

General

This agreement is the entire understanding between you and us regarding your relationship to our system. We reserve the right to revise this agreement at any time by updating this posting. If we do so, you will be given the opportunity of agreeing with the revisions. If any part of this agreement is determined to be unlawful, void or unenforceable, that part will be deemed severable and will not affect the validity and enforceability any remaining provision. If either you or we fail to notify the other of any violations of this agreement, this will not mean that you or we cannot notify the other of future violations of any part of this agreement.

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